


In the Afternoon as the Light Dims

by micehell



Category: Haven - Fandom
Genre: Drama, Gen, odd and a little bit scary maybe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-31
Updated: 2010-10-31
Packaged: 2017-11-12 02:39:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/485759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/micehell/pseuds/micehell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He never did answer the question.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Afternoon as the Light Dims

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Bush, quel surprise.

The small orange pail kept bouncing against his leg as he walked down the street, a muted _thump thump thump_ that followed him no matter where he went. The pail wasn't even half full an hour into his trick or treating and Nathan sighed, wishing he lived closer to town, where the next-door neighbors were actually next-door.

The road was hardly visible in the low light as he trudged on, _thump thump thump_ , and he knew he'd have to go back soon or else deal with the indignity of getting picked up in the Andy’s squad car, sent by his father to retrieve his wayward son. If he'd dressed like a prisoner like he'd wanted, it could have all been part of his costume, but his father had just said no in his _I am the voice of God, and you will obey_ voice, and it hadn't been worth the argument.

There was still a little light shining through the trees all around, though, so he could make it to the McCreary's place by his curfew. The dying sun looked like blood through the thick walls of turning leaves that surrounded him, _thump thump thump_ , painting the disparate types into one family; orange, yellow, green, and red all shading towards black. Pine, oak, spruce, magnolia, wild cherry, hawthorn, palm... native and exotic, and just one more improbable thing about Haven.

Mrs. McCreary was all smiles as she opened the door, the pot of candy she carried still full even though it was late. _Score_ , Nathan thought, figuring she and Mr. McCreary wouldn't want to keep it all, their own children grown and moved on. He put on his best smile, let the lisp that was finally fading as he grew older come on full force, and held out his bucket, making sure to show its sadly not-full state. "Trick or treat!"

He was Captain Ahab this year, his father's idea, another thing it hadn't been worth arguing about, but she didn't comment on the costume like she usually did. She didn't drop candy in the pail or pat his head, either. She just kept smiling and smiling, her hand like iron around his wrist, and asked, "Nathan, can you feel this?"

Nathan tried to pull away from her grip, tried to hit her with the pail, _thump thump thump_ , but she stepped backwards into the dark house, the dying sun painting the windows red like blood, and pulled him along with her, further and further in until all he could see was black and red and her smile, _thump thump thump_ , her voice from the shadows without tone or timbre, without volume or inflection, as if written words had spoken rather than been said.

"Nathan, can you feel this?"

~*~

It was his cell phone that woke him, sweating and scared, his heart racing enough that he wondered if it would burst. The room was dark around him, but the display on the phone was lit, like a beacon in the darkness, and he grabbed it with relief. "Hello?"

His voice was graveled by sleep and fading fear, and his greeting had come out a question in the end, but Audrey understood him as she always did. "Hey, we got a call. I know you said you were feeling rough, but Laverne said you'd want this one. Something about Rosemary's jack-o’-lantern truffles and an annual riot?"

She sounded normal, like Audrey usually did, but Nathan knew it for the lie it was. They had a pact, though, until things settled down. He didn't ask if she was freaking out about maybe, likely, being Lucy instead of Audrey and whatever that meant, and she didn't ask him if he was freaking out about his father, either one of them. They didn't asked Duke about tattoos, either. It wouldn't last, the need to deal with things too important, but for now silence was a gold they all hoarded.

So all Nathan said was, "I'll be right there."

~*~

By the 30th, there were few places left in town that weren't covered in orange and black, rubber rats and plastic spiders, jack-o’-lanterns with gaping malevolent grins and cotton cobwebs that danced macabrely in the cool October wind. Even Rosemary's Bakery, which never advertised its presence since all the locals knew right where it was, had a string of holiday lights framing the front window, grinning glowing skeletons surrounding pies and donuts like they were getting ready to eat after so long a fast. The one thing they didn't surround, though, was Rosemary's famous Halloween truffles; tiny, cream-filled chocolate jack-o’-lanterns so perfectly formed, so amazingly good, that Rosemary could charge $10 for just two of them and yet they would still be sold out before Halloween actually got there every year.

Nathan secretly suspected she put something like crack in them, too, since every year, like clockwork, invariably a fight would break out over the last batch. By the time he arrived, it had mostly wound down, disgruntled would-be purchasers glaring malevolently at Brenda, who worked at the library and taught Sunday School down at the Methodist church, and who was blowing on a split knuckle while she clung tightly to her prize.

Rosemary, as she did every year, was sitting on her counter, sipping a cup of coffee while she watched the fight. Nathan knew better than to call her on it, or to ask why she didn't make more since she knew this would happen, having learned his lesson one donut-less week that first year he'd been with the police, but he still sighed, wishing she'd just watch television like everyone else.

Audrey, bless her desperate need for distraction, was trying to calm the losers of the fight, _Break it up now, nothing to see here_ falling tonelessly from her lips, cop clichés she didn't have to think about while she waved the former combatants off with one hand and patted her hair down with the other. Apparently no one had warned her about Brenda and the hair pulling, though at least it looked like she had escaped the biting.

Nathan smiled at her, reaching out to brush one wayward strand of her hair back, momentarily forgetting what it would do to him, that electric rush of _feeling_ that he could never properly remember in the times between. He shivered, trying to make it look like October chill rather than an almost orgasmic pleasure, not needing to fuel any of the rumors that were like life's blood to a town like Haven. "You got things settled here?"

She rolled her eyes, snorting. "One of you could have warned me how serious people were about those truffles."

Nathan shrugged. "Where would be the fun in that?"

Audrey laughed, one of the first carefree sounds Nathan had heard from her since she’d learned she wasn't Audrey. "Another trial by fire for the newbie?"

He considered that for a moment, wondering if Laverne hadn't warned her as a trick, or if she'd just thought Nathan would tell her himself. If he hadn’t been shaken by the dream, he probably would have. But the dream was another thing he didn't want to talk about, so he shrugged again. "More a welcoming ceremony."

With the crowd now resigned to their loss, the town had taken on a festive mood once again, bright splashes of orange and yellow lights and decorations that glowed in the early dark. The skeleton lights shone across Audrey's hair, making the still-rumpled bits sparkle, as if it were part of the festivity, and Nathan felt the dream recede a little, surrounded by things he knew and cared for.

Rosemary finally got up, bringing over the traditional reward for whoever broke up the fight, two truffles from the secret stash she kept behind the counter. Nathan let Audrey have both, figuring it might make up for him forgetting to tell her about the riot. Rosemary's truffles caused a riot for a reason, after all, and Audrey and her sweet tooth would surely appreciate it.

Audrey shivered with her first bite, looking as orgasmic as Nathan probably had at the touch, and he once again wondered just what Rosemary put in them. He knew not to ask, though, especially when she reappeared carrying another truffle, handing it to him with a wink and a, "Can you feel this, Nathan?"

He almost dropped the truffle, only long training of holding on to things even when he couldn't feel them saving it from a tragic end. He shook his head, sure he had heard her wrong, sure he was overreacting to the dream, _thump thump thump_ , but unable to keep the stutter from his voice when he asked, "What did you say?"

She titled her head, confused, but repeated herself easily. "I said we can't break tradition, now can we, Nathan?"

Nathan just nodded in answer, his hands twitching where he'd buried them in his pockets, _thump thump thump_ , trying to remember if this was what it was like to feel cold.

~*~

Nathan guessed he really was as stupid as the Chief said, because, seriously, how many times did Duke have to screw him over before he learned?

But Nathan was too old to go trick or treating any more, and too much of a freak, not to mention too much the Chief's son, to get invited to any cool parties, and Duke... Duke could sell sincerity. At least to social outcasts desperate enough to listen.

Which is how Nathan wound up at the McCreary's house, empty and deserted for years, decorated for Halloween year round with real cobwebs and rats, the smell of rot surrounding him. Duke and _Duke's_ friends, none of them Nathan's, were laughing with false excitement, unable to be truly unaffected by being in this place on this night, their nervous sweat lit red as the sun died towards the horizon. They pushed up behind Nathan, herding him, voices like a flock of birds, indistinct and garbled as they urged him on. Only echoes and pieces of their words carried through the shadows, _Go Go Go_ _Dare Dare Dare_ _Afraid Afraid Afraid_ like more hands at his back, driving him into the dark house, the dying sun painting the windows red like blood, further and further in until all he could see was black and red and their nervous sweat, _Afraid Afraid Afraid_ , further and further in until he couldn't see at all.

He tried to break and run, but he couldn't move, hands he couldn't feel on his wrists, pulling him along, pushing him down, and he couldn't move, couldn't move. All he could do was listen; the scrape of a foot on the floor, the faint squeak of the rats in the walls, a rustle of cloth, breathing, soft and rasping, and that voice from the shadows, without tone or timbre, without volume or inflection, "Can you feel that, Nathan?"

Nathan screamed, wanting to hear something besides that voice, but all that came out was darkness and silence and a voice from the shadows, "Can you feel that, Nathan? Can you feel that?"

~*~

He jerked forward, hitting his head on the steering wheel, unable to feel it and panicking, but there was no voice, no sound but his own desperate breathing, his racing heart, _thump thump thump_ , and the swoosh of passing cars, making their way home for Halloween.

The kids would be showing up soon, he thought, trying to will himself out of the car. Any year he wasn't on a call he made sure he handed out candy, remembering the dearth of Halloween treats from his own childhood, and not wanting the kids to grow up to be him. But the memory of his childhood was too close to the dream, and he had to force it down before he could finally let go of the wheel and climb down from the car, knees a little watery as he went inside.

Nathan paused in the doorway, sure for a moment he heard breathing from the shadowy living room, but it was just his own breath, his own heart, _thump thump thump_ , and years more than he'd wanted of standing alone were practice enough that he could calm both of them.

Even with that, though, he still handed out candy from the best lit house on the street, indoor lights, outdoor lights, and candles like a séance glowing everywhere a shadow might be. He kept the wall to his back, and everyone in his sight, and smiled at the kids even though all of them, from the ghost made from a sheet to the store-bought Superman, made his heart beat too fast.

The McCreary boy, dressed like a clown, tall and leering, with a bright red wig tinged like blood from the dying rays of sunlight, was a near thing, but Nathan didn't want the kid to tell his parents about the acting Chief who broke down and cried like a baby over a clown, so he kept his eyes firmly on the candy, and smiled through gritted teeth until he was gone.

Vince and Dave walked by, carrying candy in a bright orange pail, handing it out to the passing kids just like they did every year, and looking to anyone who didn't know them like a couple of old pedophiles scoping out the children. Nathan, far more in the know than he wanted to be about which way their kinks lay, returned their wave without worrying about it.

They handed out the last of their candy to the kids that had just left Nathan's, Vince swinging the empty pail against his leg, _thump thump thump_ , as they walked up to Nathan.

Dave, with his perpetual mild sarcasm and genuine smile asked, "Have the little blackmailers bled you dry yet?"

Vince, with his perpetual air being slightly high, laughed and said, "Can you feel that, Nathan?"

Nathan dropped the bowl of candy from hands he couldn't feel, but that he could see shaking, Tootsie Pops and bite size Snickers spreading like a pool of sugar around him and the plastic pot rolling a wobbling path down the stairs. He could barely breathe, heart racing, _thump thump thump_ , but he managed to stutter out, "What?"

Vince and Dave looked down at the candy and up at him, their confusion consanguineous in a way their features usually weren't. "I said I hope you saved enough for your partner, considering what a sweet tooth she has... are you alright, Nathan?"

Nathan let them help him get the candy, let them talk and laugh, at ease, and never answered Vince's question while his hands shook, the candy bowl bouncing against his leg, a muted _thump thump thump_ that followed him no matter where he went.

~*~

He knew it was a dream this time. The real Audrey, or at least the fake Audrey that lived outside his dreams, wouldn't even know where the McCreary place was, let alone tell him they had a report of a burglary from there.

Nathan outside the dream would have never approached her, would never have turned his back to her, but the Nathan in the dream was pushed into the dark house, the dying sun painting the windows red like blood, further and further in until all he could see was black and red and Audrey's hair sparkling under the skeleton lights.

He could feel her hands on his wrists, far too strong to be real, far too tight not to hurt. It was novel at first, the feeling of pain he’d never been able to properly remember, but as the shadows pressed in all around, blotting out everything but the sound of her harsh breathing in his ear, the feel of nails digging into his wrists, the bones grinding under her hold, the novelty of feeling gave way to the need for it to stop.

There were others with her hidden in the darkness, but he could hear them, feel them through her touch. The scrape of a foot on the floor, the faint squeak of the rats in the walls, a rustle of cloth close behind him, breath hot and cold against his ear, and that voice from the shadows, without tone or timbre, without volume or inflection, "Can you feel that, Nathan?"

With the first cut across his back, with the first broken bone, the first burn deep into his flesh, and everything that came after, all Nathan could do was scream, his heart beating to the rhythm of the pain, _thump thump thump_ , but he never did answer the question.

~*~

Nathan woke to light, white and red with remembered pain, a scream still on his lips, and Reverend Driscoll, tall and leering, standing over him, asking, "Can you feel that, Nathan? Can you feel that?"

/story


End file.
